The Telegraph and Daily Mail report that the next Conservative government will "rewrite civil service contracts to include a new legally-binding "fiduciary responsibility to taxpayers"." Civil servants who are "judged to have failed to spend public money prudently will be disciplined or dismissed."
ConservativeHome welcomes this incentive-based approach to cost-reduction. It is hard for an information-starved opposition party to identify comprehensive savings. Empowering frontline public sector staff to deliver appropriate economies complements the party’s belief in (1) professionalising the public services and (2) in decentralisation.
Shadow Chancellor George Osborne and the shadow cabinet minister in charge of the party’s preparations for government, Francis Maude, "will also publish a dossier entitled "It’s your money" detailing examples of wasteful spending – including the billions spent on the NHS super computer, ID cards, refurbishing the Ministry of Defence and Government consultants."
Tim Montgomerie